Systems and Methods for Providing Information Incorporating Reinforcement-Based Learning and Feedback

1. A method for feedback-driven provision of information in relation to a plurality of information resources, the method comprising: accessing a mapping among a plurality of information recources stored on one or more repositories; monitoring an action of a first user in relation to at least a subset of the information resources; obtaining a feedback metric associated with the action of the first user in relation to the at least the subset of the plurality of information resources; and providing output information related to the plurality of information resources based at least in part on the mapping and the feedback metric.

2. A computer program product comprising computer-readable instructions carried on a computer readable medium which, when executed by the processor of a suitable computer, cause the computer to perform a method for feedback-driven provision of information in relation to a plurality of information resources, the method comprising: accessing a mapping among a plurality of information resources stored on one or more repositories; monitoring an action of a first user in relation to at least a subset of the information resources; obtaining a feedback metric associated with the action of the first user in relation to the at least the subset of the plurality of the information resources; and providing output information related to the plurality of information resources based at least in part on the mapping and the feedback metric.

3. A method according to claim 1 wherein the output information comprises one or more recommended actions for a particular user in relation to the plurality of information resources, the one or more recommended action relating to a corresponding recommended one of the information resources.

4. A method according to claim 3 wherein the particular user is different than the first user.

5. A method according to claim 3 comprising: monitoring actions of each of a plurality of first users in relation to the information resources; obtaining a plurality of feedback metrics, each feedback metric related to the interaction of a corresponding one of the plurality of first users with the information resources; and using the received plurality of feedback metrics as a basis for updating values of state-table records associated with the information resources, wherein each feedback metric is used as a basis for updating values of a corresponding subset of the state-table records which comprises state-action pairs corresponding to the monitored actions of the corresponding one of the first users in relation to the information resources.

6. A method according to claim 4 wherein obtaining the feedback metric comprises receiving a grade resulting from the first user taking an assessment, the assessment comprising one or more questions related to information included in the information resources.

7. A method according claim 4 wherein receiving the feedback metric comprises receiving the feedback metric from an instructor based on the instructor's assessment of a level of understanding of the first user of information included in the information resources.

8. A method according to claim 4 wherein monitoring the action of the first user comprises determining that the first user has interacted with a particular set of information resources and wherein obtaining the feedback metric comprises obtaining an assigned feedback metric in the event that the first user has interacted with the particular set of information resources.

9. A method according to claim 4 wherein monitoring the action of the first user comprises determining that the first user has interacted with one or more particular information resources a threshold number of times and wherein obtaining the feedback metric comprises obtaining an assigned feedback metric in the event that the first user has interacted with the one or more particular information resources the threshold number of times.

10. A method according to claim 4 wherein obtaining the feedback metric comprises obtaining user-evaluation feedback from the first user, the user-evaluation feedback relating to the first user's perception of the first user's interaction with the information resources.

11. A method according to claim 4 wherein accessing the information resources from the one or more repositories comprises electronically accessing the information resources from the one or more information repositories.

12. A method according to claim 4 wherein monitoring the actions of the first user in relation to the information resources comprises providing a user interface through which the first user accesses the information resources and logging the actions of the first user through the user interface.

13. A method according to claim 4 comprising monitoring actions of the particular user in relation to the information resources to establish a historical state of the particular user and wherein providing the output information comprising one or more recommended actions for the particular user in relation to the information resources is based at least in part on the historical state of the particular user.

14. A method according to claim 4 comprising: subjecting the particular user to a diagnostic assessment comprising one or more questions related to information contained in the information resources; ascertaining one or more questions from the diagnostic assessment which were answered incorrectly by the particular user; and wherein providing the output information comprising one or more recommended actions for the particular user in relation to the information resources is based at least in part on the one or more incorrectly answered questions.

15. A method according to claim 4 comprising: receiving one or more taxonomy items and, for each taxonomy item, establishing a mapping between the taxonomy item and each of the information resources.

16. A method according to claim 4 wherein providing the output information comprising one or more recommended actions for the particular user comprises providing an action path for the particular user, the action path comprising a structured plurality of recommended actions for the particular used in relation to the information resources.

17. A method according to claim 4 wherein providing the output information comprising one or more recommended actions for the particular user comprises providing a plurality of recommended actions and wherein providing the plurality of recommended actions comprises: filtering state-table records associated with the information resources to obtain a subset of the state-table records whose state-actions pairs include states comprising historical actions which match a current state of particular user, the current state of the particular user comprising historical actions of the particular user in relation to the information resources; and selecting at least one of the plurality of recommended actions to be an action corresponding to one of the subset of the state-table records having the highest value.

18. A method according to claim 4 wherein each state-table record associated with the information resources attributes a plurality of values to its corresponding state-action pair, each of the plurality of values maintained in a corresponding value field and wherein at least one of the value fields comprises a personalization value field characterized by an evaluation characteristic.